Excited for the draft? Start with last year’s first pick

TAMPA — Even at 6-foot-5, 259 pounds, it was easy to lose sight of Joe Tryon-Shoyinka.

Having opted out of his final year of football at the University of Washington and unable to find a position to call his own, the Bucs’ first-round pick appeared lost at times last season.

“Coming into the building, I was just trying to find the right room for our meeting,” Tryon-Shoyinka admitted.

Of course, it’s easy to disappear on the depth chart of a defending Super Bowl champion that returned 22 starters.

Tryon-Shoyinka was forced to get in wherever he could fit in. He played both outside linebacker positions, defensive end, defensive tackle and even some inside linebacker.

He finished with 29 tackles, 4 sacks and 3 passes defensed.

“In some ways we may have done Joe a disservice because there were so many things he could do, and we moved him all over the place,” Bucs co-defensive coordinator Kacy Rodgers said. “As our roster stands right now, he can be in one place and he is a tremendous athlete and I expect to see tremendous growth in him.”

Tryon-Shoyinka, the final pick of the first round, is the only player to have a significant impact from the Bucs’ 2021 draft class:

Former Florida quarterback Kyle Trask (Round 2, 64th overall) was inactive for all 17 regular-season and both postseason games.

Notre Dame offensive lineman Robert Hainsey ( 3⁄95th) played 31 offensive snaps (5%).

North Texas receiver/kick returner Jaelon Darden (4⁄129th) struggled, playing in only nine games. He had 142 punt return yards on 19 attempts (7.5 avg.), but 42 yards came on one play.

Linebackers K.J. Britt ( 5⁄176th) and Grant Stuard ( 7⁄259th) were limited to special teams.

BYU cornerback Chris Wilcox (7⁄251st) did not make the team and is now with the Indianapolis Colts.

Only a year earlier, didn’t the Bucs net Pro Bowl tackle Tristan Wirfs and safety Antoine Winfield Jr. along with running back Ke’Shawn Vaughn? Has general manager Jason Licht lost his touch?

Not necessarily. But Tryon-Shoyinka has the highest upside from last year’s draft class. For that matter, he could out-perform any player the Bucs select April 28-30. They own the 27th overall selection in the first round.

That’s why it’s so difficult to evaluate a draft class after only one or two years.

“There was a lot on Joe’s plate,” linebacker Lavonte David said. “People may not know, but he had to do a lot of different things for us. You had to get him on the field, a player like that . ...

“Now he has an opportunity to be a full-time starter. I’m looking forward to that. He showed flashes when he did have a chance to play a full game. Now he has an opportunity to play a full 17 games. It should be a great season for him.”

A year ago, Tryon-Shoyinka was stuck behind Pro Bowl outside linebackers Jason Pierre-Paul and Shaquil Barrett.

However, Pierre-Paul played in only 12 games and battled through most of those with a torn rotator cuff. He finished with only two sacks, his fewest since 2015 when he played in only eight games following a July 4 fireworks accident.

Pierre-Paul, 33, is an unrestricted free agent. The Bucs’ plan is to play Tryon-Shoyinka at Pierre-Paul’s outside linebacker spot and leave him there.

“That’s the plan, to play one position,” Tryon-Shoyinka said. “But at the end of the day, a sack is a sack no matter where you get it from.

“Just being able to get in that zone and find your momentum as a rusher. A lot of people don’t realize that it takes a feel to get into your zone. As a rusher, if you don’t have that feel, if you haven’t had this amount of reps in the game, there’s only so many things you can do with it.”

Tryon-Shoyinka’s best games were the ones he started. With Pierre-Paul out with the shoulder injury, he had two sacks, two tackles for loss and four quarterback hits in a 19-17 win at New England in Week 4.

“The thing he did last year, a lot of people didn’t notice but we had to change different packages when we had Devin [White] out for a week or so and Lavonte out,” Rodgers said. “So we were light at the linebacker position and we stuck Joe in there and he lined up at inside linebacker. And we also played scrambling quarterbacks . ... We put this guy all over the place and he handled all of it.

“Not only did he have to learn outside linebacker, he had to learn inside linebacker. He had to learn inside and we went to a four-man rush and ran games with him. He had to physically become an interior rusher for us. So this guy’s ability is tremendous.”